Aww yeah! Today we have a very special lesson for you guys with the incredible
dancer singer and English learner just like you, Shakira!
Now this lesson is broken into two parts: first we will learn with three of
Shakira's and most famous songs and then we will look at the five reasons why she
speaks such fluent confident English and how you can do it too.
And if you want to
get fluent confident English then this is the perfect place to do it because every
week we help you to understand fast speaking natives without getting lost,
without missing the jokes and without subtitles just like Shreesha who says
that thanks to our channel she can speak English fluently and you can too, just hit that
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Hey would you like to understand natives no matter how fast we speak? And wouldn't
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You will learn alongside the first two seasons of the TV series Friends which
various academic studies show is the best series out there for learning
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We look forward to meeting you inside.
Hey if you like singing and dancing with Shakira then we have a ton
more lessons teaching you English with different songs and you can check that
out by cleaning up here or down in the description below after you finish this lesson.
So, as you may know, Shakira is from Colombia, which obviously means that
is not a native English speaker even though if she kind of sounds like one so
in this part of the lesson we're actually going to take a look at some
different interviews with her to try to understand together the five keys to her
English learning process because she really is living proof that with grit
and effort it is possible to achieve your goals learning English and speak
fluently and confidently.
So let's go!
So as you will see in the following
interview the first piece of advice consists of making English a part of
your everyday life.
Let's take a look at how Shakira did this.
So Shakira had to learn English in order to reach her goals as a singer
Before she could barely speak English at all but you can
see that tying it to her passions of singing and songwriting she was able to
make it a fun part of her everyday life.
It truly is amazing that she's able to
write her own songs as an English learner with such creative lyrics so how
much time do you spend per day in English? You can maximize this time by
doing the things that you already loved but in English this could be writing a
poem singing in the shower, listening to a podcast or even just watching a great TV show.
Now second it's important to acknowledge that Shakira actually didn't
do it all on her own when she decided that she was going to start producing
music in English her manager got her a tutor.
Now while you can learn a lot on your own for most of us it will be impossible to actually
get really fluent confident English without the assistance of a great teacher.
Now the reason that this is so important is because at some point in
our learning journey we hit a wall and we get to a point where it's really
difficult to advance any further on our own and it gets really slow and really
tedious, so a teacher is really great because they can actually provide you
with feedback and they can actually point out your errors and give you
guidance so that you can over then and furthermore a really great
teacher will actually help you in achieving your goals.
Now if you're interested in learning more on this topic then I highly recommend a podcast
that we recently made which I'll link down in the description below and keep
in mind that you don't necessarily have to get a native teacher, in fact in some
cases it's actually better to have someone who speaks your own language
because that person has probably had to overcome a lot of the same difficulties
that you're going to face on your English learning journey and furthermore
Shakira wasn't afraid to ask for help: her friend Gloria Stefon helped to give
her the confidence that she could be as successful in English as she was in
Spanish so it's really crucial that you surround yourself by people who support your dream.
Now, who do you have around you that actually
supports your dream of learning English what I suggest is that you find a friend
who is also learning English and that you hold each other accountable in other
words you kind of tell each other your goals and you check in every week or
every two weeks and you kind of make sure that you're on the right path to
reach them another thing you could actually try is actually speaking
completely in English with this friend now I know it's going to be really weird
and awkward in the beginning but actually when you start to do this you
will notice just huge changes in your English fluency.
So third Shakira sees the language as a tool to connect with other people
in fact after she learned English she decided that she also wanted to learn
other languages so she also speaks fluent Portuguese, Catalan, Italian and French.
So it's really important that like Shakira you see the language as a tool
for connecting with different people from all around the world not as a
boring subject that you have to study and then on the other hand it's really
useful when you learn a third language to better understand the second
language as well as the learning process in general.
So I personally have learned
six different languages and I find with each new and I learned I understand all
sorts of new things about the other ones and I get much more efficient in the
language learning process.
So for example, for you as an English Learner if you
were to learn French you would immensely increase your vocabulary in English
because so much of this vocabulary is derived from French this is terms like
rendezvous, maladroit, c'est la vie that we also use in everyday English
you just have to pronounce them like an American not like in French.
So, the fourth thing is that Shakira has a really big WHY for learning English that
is a really huge purpose for why she's doing it now on the one hand she uses it
to connect to other cultures and we can really see this in her music she is
truly a global citizen and beyond this she's using it to make a difference in
the world and this is for example how she's helping children.
Now for you also as an English Learner it is
really important that you have a really big WHY for learning English and this
is not just reaching English fluency this should be something much more
deeply rooted that motivates you through the difficult times that you're going to
encounter on your journey to English fluency now having this big WHY will make
you much more likely to be successful.
Now if your WHY connects to something that
you're passionate about that's even better as we saw for Shakira in the
beginning it was just being able to write and sing her own music so I want
to know what is your WHY for learning English? Are you using it to make your
own personal contribution to the world? In a recent podcast we talked all about
different ways that you can find your WHY and use it as motivation to propel you
towards English fluency, you will find that also down in the description below.
Finally Shakira definitely has a growth mindset now if you have a growth mindset
this means that you believe that your abilities can be developed and is not
just something that you're born with now on the other hand if you have a fixed
mindset you believe that basic qualities like intelligence and talent cannot be
changed or developed.
And as I showed you today this is exactly the case of
Shakira she had a really big WHY, she worked extremely hard, she never gave up
she surrounded herself by the people who supported her and she always believed
that she could be better, and this is exactly why she succeeded so when it
comes to learning English, do you have a growth or a fixed mindset?
How can you know?
Well, first of all when you hit a difficult period or you feel like you
can't do something what do you tell yourself what do you hear that voice in
your head saying? Do you tell yourself that you can't because of where you live,
because you can't travel to an english-speaking country, that you don't
have enough money or maybe it's actually something about you genetically that you
just can't learn a language? Or do you tell yourself that you just have to work
harder or maybe find a more creative way or maybe
ask someone for help!
So Shakira is obviously very hardworking and everything she sets
her mind to and I hope that these five lessons from her will help you to up
your game learning English.
Now this is actually
the first lesson like this where we actually broke down what an English
learner is doing to be successful, so if you would like more lessons like this
where we actually take a celebrity and show you how they learned English then
please give us a like down below and if you have an idea of someone you'd like
to learn with then just comment it and maybe we'll make a lesson with them!
So finally other than all the tips that we've given you today if you want to
speak English more like Shakira a really great place to start is with our Fluent with Friends course.
because it will give you some confidence in your English you
will learn the vocabulary that natives really use and you will learn all about
American culture, you can check that out and now it's time to go beyond the
classroom and live your English, aww yeah!
Zootopia is a fantastic Disney animated movie and it
actually features the voice and singing of Shakira!
Zootopia is a unique place
it's a crazy beautiful diverse city where we celebrate our differences.